


I, You, We

by Shenanigans



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Gen, Possibly Pre-Slash, Prompt Fic, blink and you miss it Scott/Isaac, stiles needs a fucking hug
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-08
Updated: 2013-08-08
Packaged: 2017-12-22 18:34:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,660
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/916624
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shenanigans/pseuds/Shenanigans
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompt: Isaac and Stiles cuddles. This took a left hand turn at cuddling and became something about Stiles needing a hug because he's breaking down.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I, You, We

**Author's Note:**

> unbetaed, written on the fly, all typos are mine blah blah blah. Thank you for reading!

Characters: Isaac Lahey, Stiles Stilinski

Prompt: Isaac and Stiles cuddles. [didn't quite make it there because it took a left hand turn at lord knows what, but it's something.]

It took Isaac five minutes of pacing, head tilted to the side and chin cocked like a dog confused by something only he can hear before he realized that it was a siren- far off and muddled with the slanting rash of rain against the windows. The lights flickered, a promise of the far off destruction, the crackle of trees as they bent and broke to sway branches into the power lines. If he focused, he could pick out the quiet murmur of voices upstairs, pitched nearly subvocal as Peter and Derek spoke over Cora’s supine form. Isaac had set her down, pushed and corralled out of the room by Peter to wait, worrying a path from the table to the base of the stairs and back to touch the round edged light before starting over. He was exiled downstairs and chewed the edge of his thumb bloody.

Stiles was staring at the map on the table. He’d been staring at it for ten minutes.

Another circuit and Isaac pulled out his phone, checking helplessly for a text. A word. Anything. Another circuit and Isaac rapped his knuckles against the heavy wooden beam. He didn’t let himself think about the hole he was leaving, circling where Boyd had bled out. He’d scrubbed the floor despite the way the water they’d siphoned out had gone pale pink. There wasn’t a stain, but some things left stains where they couldn’t be seen.

Isaac knew about hidden bruises.

The loft lit up, strobed white before the crack followed, deafening him as he flinched away, hands over his ears. He could feel it vibrate up the length of his shins, pulsing through the cement to wobble through the soles of his boots.

Stiles didn’t move. He had wide wrists and square palmed hands, long fingers splayed at each bottom corner. There was a gauntness to him that hadn’t been there last year. There was a wiry strength that had been hammered and honed, stress and determination making him something more than the round faced boy from Chemistry class. Isaac settled to a stop at his right, hovering and peering down at the marks on the map, following the contour lines of the topography with careful eyes. The lines of electromagnetic flows were marked clearly in blue. The deaths in black. The kidnappings in red. 

“We’ll find them.” He surprised himself with the words, shooting a determined look at the map instead of looking over.

“You sure about that?” Stiles asked, voice flat and low as he turned, jaw gone tight as he scrubbed at his eyes with a quick cuff and straightened. He inhaled, stomach going taut as his shoulders canted and threw a look like a blow. “Scott left. Cora’s dying. We have what? Peter. Derek?” His lip curled in time with his fingers, forearms cording as his heel started to jiggle. It kept an off beat tempo to the pound of his heart. “ _You._ ”

Isaac startled, head whipping back as he threw an affronted look. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“ _They_ have Scott. She has Mrs McCall.” Stiles paused, inhaling a breath through teeth like a seive as he stepped forward. “She has my _Dad._ ” 

“And we’l-”

“Oh my god! You don’t get it. She has all the pieces. She’s going to murder my Dad? For what? To kill that Alpha pack? Where’s Scott?” He paused, eyes going wide as his head cocked, waiting for an answer before plowing on. “Oh, right, he’s gone off with the same pack that she wants to destroy! Great! This is the best day ever. We’re totally going to go against an Alpha pack and a psychotic murdering _druid_ with a half trained puppy, a psychotic family murderer who tried to kill us all, and Derek who can’t keep his dick out of the lunatics with a taste for destruction. First it was fire. Now? Now we have magic and god knows where Deaton is. So what?” He flung his hands out, looking around like he was waiting for an answer.

Isaac took a half step back, anger cloying spicy in the back of his throat.

“What do we have? Oh right. Nothing! We have nothing! _We_ have an Alpha who I have never once seen actually win a fight. _We_ have a pack of three, one of which isn’t going to be useful and the other two I don’t trust any farther than I can throw them.” He flailed his arms. “And I don’t work out, so that’s not very far.” He paused, widening his eyes like he expected Isaac to answer. “ _We_ have a dude who likes to shoot werewolves and a girl who likes to stab them or shoot them with arrows. Unless you have some crazy arrow plan that involves killing people who don’t die and racking up a body count that’s epic, I suggest you shut the hell up and stop acting like a beaten dog and think of something useful beyond-” Stiles cut off voice cracking right down the middle, eyes wide enough to show white around the brown and dropped into a flaming parody, “ _We’re_ going to find them.

“We? _We_ aren’t doing jack.” Stiles waved his hand between them, fingertips smacking against Isaac’s breastbone before curling into fists again. He lifted his chin, stubborn around the way his eyes went glossy and hot, face blotchy in the quick pulse flashes of lightning outside.  “Me? I’m going to find my Dad. So I suggest you stuff your little platitudes under a pile of milkbones, Lahey, and get the hell away from me.” He sneered, mouth pulling in a wet line as he shoved. “Or do something new and be _useful_.”

There was a breath and all Isaac could think about was the way the earth had smelled in the grave. That deep it smelled colder than the topsoil, wet and damp. He remembered the way it had filled his nails, caught gritty as he clawed, the soft dark patter of debris on his face and in his hair. He thought about the sudden snapping pain of his arm breaking, training to be a soldier in a war he didn’t really understand, but had to be better than the cold war at home. He thought about the weeks of looking and following a scent that seemed like it was everywhere but fading and slipping away. He could taste blood and the hazy snot sweet of concussions. There was the sudden cold of ice water. The pierce of claws. The heavy feel of knuckles snapping his jaw to the side. Gasoline.

He could feel the way the anger roiled, blackening around the edges of his vision and tuning him out. It was instinctive like reaching for a handhold when falling. He was only hazily aware of the way he reacted, catching Stiles by the wrist.

"Let go."

He was only vaguely aware of the kicks and blows.

"I said let fucking go."

He was used to it.

"Isaac! Let me fucking go. _Fuck_ you. _Fuck you_. Let me _go!"_

He’d been taking a hit for as long as he could remember. Stiles words passed from syllables to vowels, animal and angry as he struggled and hit and clawed and kicked at Isaac.

"I _hate_ you!"

Sometimes he wondered what it was like for everyone else, but it passed with the strike that snapped his jaw to the side, eyes flashing gold and vision tunneling red as he focused on Stiles.

_My heroes._

Melissa McCall’s bedroom smelled like clean sheets and the subtler floral of her shampoo. It smelled like the fading ginger of chinese takeout and the white muddy flavor of her face cream. Scott was at his left, snoring quietly in the chair, head dropped back and mouth open. He was steady and warm, kind in a way that didn’t seem real. He could hear the faint fizz pop of the soda ticking in the cans, the butter of the popcorn oily and salty but warm. It felt like yellow afternoon sunlight that hit the haze and touched everything gold. It felt like what he remembered of his mother’s smile when she’d pushed her chin into the top of his head, arms wrapped around him. He’d watched them sleep, awkward and hyper aware of the way they _fit_ so easily that everyone else fit with them.

Scott’s room smelled like Stiles. Stiles smelled like Scott. 

_I don’t want you to get hurt._

But he did. He hurt and he understood. Realization sudden as the first sweet sip of soda and a plan to keep watch. Stiles was important.

“Stiles,” he managed, fending off the last flurry of blows as the breath choked and twisted in Stiles’ chest. It was ugly, wrenching and black with worry around the edges. It smelled bitter and enveloping and Isaac didn’t realize what he was doing until he’d caught him by the arms and drug him close, wrapped tight as he struggled, fitful and spasming with violence around the wet heat soaking into the fabric of Isaac’s t-shirt.

“When things are falling apart,” Cam had said, hands folded over his stomach as they sprawled out on the blanket, sun warm on Isaac’s hair and the air smelling of summer and patchouli. “Sometimes all you can do is hold on.”

He cupped the back of Stiles’ head, tucking his chin to the soft fumbling spikes of his hair and held on, holding him up and holding him through. He wet his lips, turning to lean back against the table and tangle their feet, feeling the way Stiles shuddered to a stop and just bawled- broken and unhinged as a child who’d lost everything. Isaac recognized it. He’d already been there.

The loft was quiet. 

“I’ve got you.”


End file.
